No Question Left Behind:
Bringing Guided-Inquiry Curricula into Science and Mathematics Classrooms
Presentations
Leslie Atkins, Assistant Professor Science
Education & Physics
California
State
University
,
Chico
Invited Talk
Inquiry As Argument: Debating Our Way Into Science
In this
talk I will be presenting strategies and techniques for getting students
debating scientific ideas in classrooms. But scientific debates can be pretty unpredictable and often seem to
work against the very ideas we hope students to learn. For example, students might voice
misconceptions, or misuse evidence; they can get out of hand, with heated
arguments, or encourage students to challenge well-established scientific
ideas. What evidence do we have to
suggest that these debates are actually worthwhile? In this presentation, I will focus on the
research on scientific discourse and debate: why it matters, what it looks
like, and what we know about improving scientific debates in classrooms.
Interactive Workshop
Structuring Scientific Debates
Research
continues to suggest that learning how to do science involves learning how to
“talk science,” and one important way in which scientists talk is
argument—posing different claims about how the world works and supporting and
critiquing those claims with evidence, logic, representations and
consistency. This workshop will engage
participants in a scientific debate, and then discuss ways to incorporate
debate into your own instruction, from choosing questions to laying the ground
rules, to incorporating argumentation into labs and lab write-ups. This workshop will be decidedly “low tech”
and should be easy to integrate into existing instruction.
Anita Bernhardt,
Science & Technology Specialist
Maine Department
of Education
Interactive Workshop
The Importance of Talk and
Argument in the Science Classrooms
Greater instructional attention must be paid to
talk and argument in the Science classroom. The research base behind the recommendations related to talk and
argument outlined in the National Academy of Sciences 2008 publication Ready,
Set, Science! assists educators in understanding what it means to engage in
talk and argument in science classrooms and describes why talk and argument are
so essential to the practice of science. The session offers specific instructional
strategies to support talk and argument. The research that supports the
recommendations in Ready, Set, Science! are derived from grade K-8
research and contexts, however the recommendations and many of the strategies
are applicable to classrooms across the K-12 continuum.
Patricia Bernhardt, Life Science Teacher,
James
F.
Doughty
Middle School
,
Bangor
,
Maine
.
Elizabeth Haynes,
Mathematics Teacher,
Troy
Howard
Middle
School
,
Belfast
,
Maine
Tracy Vassiliev, Applied
Science and Accelerated Physical Science Teacher, middle schools,
Bangor
Maine
Interactive Workshop
Wood Your
Students Use Real Data?
This workshop will focus on wood, one of
Maine
’s most important resources.
The workshop will include a Wood Composite Activity that uses saw dust and
flour. Participants will predict and
test the strength of different baked plank mixtures. The directions for making
the planks and baking them will be provided as well. Information for the uses of composites and
the
University
of
Maine
’s research with these
materials will be provided. Methods for
testing the Antimicrobial Effects of Wood Extracts will be demonstrated. Wood
extracts are relatively easy to make using a rice cooker. Teachers will be
asked to predict which extract they think will have an antimicrobial effect on
E. coli bacteria. Proper microbiology techniques and disposal concerns will be
discussed and practiced. Sample Petri dishes will be available. Tree cores will be collected, measured, and
plotted on Data Studio. One of the goals of this workshop is to provide inquiry
based activities with meaningful data that feature wood. Development of these lessons was made
possible by FBRI, Forest Bioproduct Research Initiative at the
University
of
Maine
.
Diane Ebert-May,
Professor, Plant Biology
Michigan
State
University
Invited Talk
Breaking the Mold:
rethinking professional development in K-16 STEM education
As the call to reform undergraduate science,
technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education accelerates
nationally, we use ‘scientific teaching’ to describe active learning strategies
and teaching methods that have been systematically tested and shown to reach
diverse students. Emphasis on assessment assists us in determining not only if
our students understand key principles, demonstrate basic scientific skills,
interconnect ideas, and exercise critical thought, but also why students can do so or not. Intensive
faculty development activities to achieve improvement in undergraduate science
education have occurred in universities and colleges for nearly two decades.
Our laboratory group is engaged in research driven by two questions: (1) How has faculty teaching changed in
response to professional development? and (2) Do levels of student learning and
academic achievement also change significantly in response to the changes in
instruction? We use design research methodologies and structural equation
modeling to identify and analyze the variables that correlate with faculty and
student change. In this seminar, we will examine the dimensions of pedagogical
change that enable students to advance from rote learning toward higher-level
thinking.
Interactive Workshop
Teaching for Understanding
in Science: Active Learning and Assessment
The workshop is based on current research about
K-16 science curriculum reform, how students learn, and how assessment improves
student learning. Biology is the most complex, interdisciplinary field in science
and requires learners to move across scales and systems to solve problems. A
limiting factor in students’ preparation for learning biology or any science is
the ability to connect concepts and processes. How do learners build cognitive
networks and reasoning skills to understand complex systems? What tools
facilitate complex system learning? How to we do this and how do we prepare
future teachers to do this? We will use a genuine biological problem to (1)
move from a teacher-centered to learner-centered classroom, (2) actively engage
students in learning, (3) develop model-based assessments based on objectives
that provide substantive data about student learning, and (4) analyze the data
that should inform subsequent instruction.
Mary Madden, Associate Research Professor
University
of
Maine
Interactive Workshop
Inspiring Girls in the STEM
fields: From Research to Practice.
Women remain under-represented in Science,
Technology, Mathematics, and Engineering in colleges and workplaces. So,
how can educators inspire girls to explore and consider opportunities in STEM
fields? This session will present an overview of research-based practices
for encouraging girls in STEM and facilitate discussion on how the research
applies to informal and formal education settings in
Maine
. Also, information
about the Maine Girls' Collaborative Project and how to apply for mini grants
to support projects designed to introduce girls to the possibilities in STEM
will be shared.
Carolyn
Malstrom
, Director of Curriculum for Biomedical
Sciences
Project
Lead The Way, Inc.
Invited Talk
Project
Lead The Way® Curricular Programs Promote STEM achievement
Project Lead The Way® curricular programs are being implemented in over 3000 schools located in all
50 states. The Engineering program consists of eight high school courses and
five middle school units. The Biomedical Sciences Program™, in the final stages
of development, will consist of a sequence of four high school courses. The
highly contextual, hands-on curriculum developed by Project Lead The Way, Inc.
was cited in the 2007 National Academy of Sciences report Rising Above the
Gathering Storm: Energizing and
Employing America for a Brighter Economic Future as the model for
developing world-class standards-based curricula. Students enrolled in the
engineering program scored higher on the NAEP-referenced High Schools That Work
Assessments for reading, mathematics, and science than students enrolled in
other CTE programs. Students enrolled a PLTW® curriculum program are
significantly more likely to complete at least four college-preparatory
mathematics courses and at least three college-preparatory laboratory-based
science courses than their peers. In student surveys, students enrolled in a
PLTW® curriculum program were significantly more likely to rate
their high school experience as important in preparing them for the future. The
presentation will provide an overview of the Engineering and Biomedical
Sciences curricular programs and discuss how the courses in these programs promote
student achievement in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics.
Interactive Workshop
Project
Lead The Way® Biomedical Sciences™ Program—Hands-on Investigative
Science
Working in pairs or small groups attendees will
complete a variety of activities selected from the Project Lead The Way®
Biomedical Sciences™ courses: Principles of the Biomedical Sciences™, Human
Body Systems™, and Medical Interventions™. Multiple lab stations with different
hands-on activities will be set-up for the session. Participants will be able
to select several different activities to complete, and then discuss how the
activities could engage and challenge their students. Participants have the
opportunity to:
·
Measure blood pressure,
EKG, and lung capacity using Vernier® sensors and the LabVIEW™
computer program.
·
Estimate the height of a
person using measurements of leg bones.
·
Examine visual
perception, including color vision, depth perception, peripheral vision, and
effects of astigmatism.
·
Design and build a 3-D
model of an enzyme’s active site.
·
Plan a genetic
engineering experiment using paper plasmids.
·
Design and build a
simple prosthetic hand and arm capable of picking up an empty cup.
W. Tad Johnston,
Mathematics Teacher
William
S.
Cohen
School
,
Bangor
,
Maine
Interactive Workshop
Guiding the discovery of y =
mx + b, y = abx, and y = x2 + b
If the record of mathematics
history is to be believed, much of what is called “algebra” was developed to
model physical observations or solve “real” problems. We can attempt to provide our students with
scaffolded opportunities to invent some mathematics on their own and
experience, in a small way, what it is like to work as mathematicians.
Participants will play (guided by
lab sheets) with some physical activities and discuss others that can be
modeled with linear, exponential, and quadratic equations. These situations
will be analyzed in terms of rate of change, slope, y-intercepts with special
attention to the link between physical context, graph, equation and tabular representation. Suggestions for orchestration of classroom
activity, formative assessment, summative assessment, and moving to formalism
will be shared as well as some student work produced this year. It is hoped
that participants will also share their experiences, discuss the balance
between free exploration and proscribed procedures, and develop a set of
guidelines for designing mathematical labs that promote student inquiry.
Edward Prather,
Associate Research Scientist and Senior Lecturer
Director of the
Center for Astronomy Education
University
of
Arizona
Keynote Address
An Astronomer Walks into a
Buddhist
Temple
and
Asks.....
During
the Summer of 2007 I was fortunate to have been asked to travel to northern
India
to teach classes on topics in
Physics and Astronomy to a group of Tibetan Buddhist Monks. For a month, I
shared morning tea and meditation, ate all meals and lived with a cadre of
Monks at the Dzongsar Institute for Advance Studies of Buddhist Philosophy and
Research in a small Tibetan village located high in the foothills of the
Himalayan mountains. I have no doubt that this time with the Monks will
stand out as one of the most personally and professionally profound experiences
in my life. I am honored to have the opportunity to share with you the
beauty, compassion and incredible perspective on teaching and learning that
this adventure into the unknown provided me.
Invited Talk
Are you really teaching if no
one is learning? Research on how
interactive-lecturing can be used to improve student learning
Acknowledging that traditional
lecture-based teaching methods are insufficient at promoting significant
conceptual gains for students is only the first step toward being able to
implement instructional strategies that will actually increase students'
understanding. Researchers at the Center for Astronomy Education (CAE) at
the
University
of
Arizona
have been developing and
evaluating the effectiveness of learner-centered instructional materials that
put students in an active role in the classroom. We have designed and
field-tested a suite of innovative instructional strategies intended for use
with collaborative student learning groups that are designed specifically for
easy integration into existing conventional lectures-based courses. As
such, these instructional materials directly address the needs of heavily
loaded teachers in that they offer effective, learner-centered, classroom-ready
activities that do not require any outside equipment/staffing or a drastic
course revision for implementation. Each activity uses a set of carefully
sequence Socratic-dialogue questions or hierarchical tasks that are coupled
with graphs, illustrations and data tables to force students to reason
critically about conceptually challenging and commonly taught topics in
physical science. The materials are based on research into student
beliefs and reasoning difficulties and make use of a conceptual change
instructional framework that promotes the intellectual engagement of
students. Our research into the effectiveness of these instructional
strategies shows that traditional lectures alone produces unsatisfactory gains
on student understanding; however, supplementing traditional instruction with
the research-validated, learner-centered activities helps students make
impressive conceptual gains over traditional instruction. A review of research,
and an overview of instructional strategies, will be provided.
Interactive Workshop
Methods for Maximizing the
Effectiveness of Interactive Lecturing
The NASA and NSF supported
University of Arizona Center for Astronomy Education (CAE), provide workshops
for both novice and experienced teachers which focus on how to best implement
effective teaching strategies shown to improve student learning on fundamental
topics in astronomy and space science. While most instructors believe that lecture is not the best
instructional approach for all their students, they are often unable to
effectively implement pedagogically sound alternative instructional strategies
that actually intellectually engage students and increase their learning.
The use of engaging questioning
techniques in the classroom can produce a greater level of collaboration among
your students and with you. The
interactions that occur when we challenge our students with appropriate,
high-level, questions can significantly increase their learning beyond what is
gained from lecture alone. Participants
in this workshop will gain first hand experience with designing questions and
implementation of different questioning techniques (most notably
think-pair-share). In addition, we will
focus on classroom teaching and learning scenarios critical to successful
implementation of the directed inquiry, small-group collaborative teaching
strategies known as Lecture-Tutorials, and Ranking-Tasks.
The
NASA
Center
for Astronomy Education is
funded by the NSF CCLI Phase III CATS Program, and the JPL Navigator Public
Engagement Program
Prather, E. E., Slater, T. F.,
Adams, J. P., Bailey, J. M., Jones, L. V., & Dostal, J.A. 2004, Research on
a Lecture-Tutorial Approach to
Teaching Introductory Astronomy for Non-Science Majors, Astronomy Education Review, 3(2), 122.
Hudgins, D. W., Prather. E. E.,
Grayson, D.J. and Smits D. P. 2006,
Effectiveness of Collaborative Ranking Tasks on Student Understanding of Key
Astronomy Concepts, Astronomy Education
Review, 5(1), p.1-22
Alice
Putti, Chemistry Teacher,
Jenison
High School
,
Jenison
,
Michigan
Sarah Toman, Chemistry
Teacher,
Western
Michigan
Christian
High School
,
Muskegon
,
Michigan
Invited
Talk
How Learning Through Inquiry Changed
Our Teaching Philosophy
Two
teachers who completed the Target Inquiry Program at
Grand
Valley State University
,
Michigan
will
describe the program's impact on their teaching philosophy. The talk will
focus on how playing the role of researcher, student, and teacher forced them
to reevaluate how they approached teaching and learning. Evidence to support
the change in their teaching philosophy will also be presented.
Interactive Workshop
How to Give Your Activities/Labs an
Inquiry Make Over.
Learn
simple strategies that will turn your students into active learners.
These strategies can be used to convert any verification lab or activity into a
more concept-rich, inquiry-based module. Participants will have an
opportunity to revise their own experiments as well as provided
activities. Participants should bring 1-2 experiments or activities they
currently use in instruction.
Bill Zoellick, Program Development Director, Yvonne
Davis, Education Program Coordinator,
Acadia
Partners for Science and Learning and Sarah
Nelson,
Senator
George
J.
Mitchell
Center
for Environmental and Watershed Research
Interactive Workshop
Mercury in Maine watersheds, biota, and people: The
Acadia
Learning Project
Over the
past two years Acadia Partners for Science and Learning, working in partnership
with the
University
of
Maine
’s
Senator
George
J.
Mitchell
Center
for Environmental and Watershed Research, has engaged more than a dozen
schools, twenty teachers, and approximately 500 students in a project that uses
a citizen science investigation as the basis for guided inquiry in science
classes. The project marries the need to
collect data about accumulation of mercury, a potent neurotoxin, in living
systems around
Maine
with the need to engage students in generating scientific questions and
gathering empirical evidence that can be used to help answer those
questions. The project has begun to
provide a new understanding of mercury levels in different organisms and
locations around the state and a new understanding of how to couple “science as
a service project” with higher level learning through inquiry. Just as important, these first two years of work
have established a foundation for continued study and implementation of useful
educational practices. This workshop
will include a review of work to date, of lessons learned, suggestions for
teachers interested in implementing authentic scientific inquiry, and future
directions.
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